Sometimes the Bird Lives
And other happenings along my street
Sometimes the bird lives.
Last Friday, my dogs found a baby finch stuck along our fence line. I was so proud of Annie, who’s losing her sight, hearing, and balance for sniffing her way to the little bird. As Kathi was helping it out, I climbed the porch steps, only to find a second chick. In seconds, this one would be fully inside Walter’s mouth. He was careful, though, and released the bird more easily than he gives up a bone. Our beagle is becoming a bird dog!
We think they may have fallen out of their nest in a storm the day before. The porch bird, the one who spent a few harrowing seconds inside of a beagle, looked either sick or very young.
And thus began a four-day stretch of a finch living on our porch, not in its intended nest, but in a new sort of nest. The adults had recently set up a second nest. We were easily able to grab that one and put the bird in it. This was the first of at least a dozen times that we wondered whether we were doing the right thing. Every time we moved the nest, and later placed it in a larger box with a towel, we asked whether the intervention would help or hurt. We didn’t always know the answer.
I’ve written before about meddling when it comes to birds, but what’s a person to do when there’s a tiny chick on their front porch fighting for its chance at city life?
The parents continued to visit and offer up worms and such. Seeing the spectacle of a feeding is a gift, is it not? So we just kept providing shaded space and hoping for growth. And it did grow! And then yesterday it fledged nest/box #2.
Meanwhile, the other chicks (we soon learned there were TWO more, not just the one wedged along the fence) spent a few days in a bush also growing and becoming more steady. The last I saw of our porch bird it was sitting on a dog leash (ready for a walk?). The next time I looked, it was gone. Now strong and ready, it most likely flew off. Not all bird stories end as happily. We got a win yesterday!
I’m hoping Walter will stop obsessing soon. If this is anything like the day we had a raccoon in the yard last summer, it’ll take a few more days.
It was never my garden anyway
Across the street in an area along the tracks, I’ve been working to disrupt some mugwort in recent years. (If you want to know more about this, see my 2024 Leadership Reflections post, which addresses both guerrilla gardening and what I learned in the Appalachian Leadership Institute.) My hope for this year was that the perennial wildflowers I put down over the winter would come up. They haven’t, and neither have the striking cosmos that self-seeded last year. But perhaps what has happened is what is meant to be. Large patches of crown vetch have been filling in, along with Queen Anne’s Lace. The vetch (another invasive, but more beneficial in this space than the mugwort) is so lush that it’s providing cover for nesting rabbits. We also have deer visiting, and the vetch doesn’t look half bad. I may keep trying with the wildflowers in upcoming years, but the space is doing its own thing this summer, reminding me that it never was my garden anyway.
An entire video about a rail wall
Also across the street is a stone rail wall that stretches the length of Pittsburgh’s South Side. I’ve been intrigued by the wall for years (check out my Instagram account, @Wall_Told). So when I took a digital storytelling class this spring and needed to create a video, I found my topic pretty easily. I hope you can take a few minutes to watch The Living Wall. Sure, it’s a video about a wall. But really it’s about the richness of community. In fact, a neighbor who attended my class’s screening event, decided that we needed to host a neighborhood screening. That’s how about 25 of us ended up spending a recent Sunday evening together, connecting through stories and simply by showing up. At one point in the video, I say, “Knowing each other is a start.” This is what that looks like.
In other news…
The Parkersburg to Pittsburgh (P2P) Corridor continues to keep me and the entire team busy! If you live in or near any of the involved counties (Wood, Ritchie, Doddridge, Harrison, Marion, Monongalia, and Fayette), you have another week to take our community survey. We’re getting great feedback and would love to have yours as well.
I’ll be in Erie soon for the PA Downtown Conference! I love Erie and especially nearby Presque Isle State Park. I’m so glad the PA Downtown Center has given me a compelling reason to get up to the lake. I’ll be exhibiting on behalf of Cycle Forward and leading a session titled, “The Corner of Trail and Main: Strategies for Leveraging Trails in Your Community.” The earliest Trail Town efforts in Pennsylvania were modeled after the Main Street approach. I’m excited to talk to Main Street managers about how they can tap into their local trails!
Recent Posts:
Why Parkersburg?
You know you’re in for a good community meeting when a registrant emails you to say he’ll be there along with his wife and a model covered bridge:
I’m so happy the baby birds made it! What a cheerful outcome.
I’ve been watching Carolina wrens nesting and raising chicks in my yard — they’re on their second brood already this year, and I had set up a camera so I’ve been able to get a much closer look at the process. It is a privilege to experience their lives up close.